Modess sanitary napkins
conducted a famous advertising
campaign from 1948 to the 1970s in
the U.S.A. Usually the only words
were "Modess
. . . . because."
Advertising journals of the time
occasionally made fun of the
series; sometimes they praised it.
In a sense, the unfinished phrase
summed up the American public's
feelings about menstruation: It's something
it couldn't talk about! Read
a Johnson & Johnson inside
account of the origin of
this campaign.

Nevertheless,
these are probably the most
elegant ads ever made for
menstrual products.

Compare aFrench ad for Modess
from probably the 1970s; a German one from 1990;
and two ads for German o.b.
tampons
to see photos America would
never dare show in advertising
for menstrual hygiene. They show
a more open French and German
attitude toward the body; the
body is NOT unspeakable!

I believe the woman in the
October 1948 ad is the famous
model Barbara
Hutton.

According to The New Yorker
magazine, Diane
Arbus, the great
photographer who committed suicide
at 48 in 1971 by slashing her
wrists, assisted her husband in
taking some of the photos for this
campaign. But she and her husband
hated
the
fashion world. She probably
had bipolar disorder and I suspect
she also hated menstruation. Just
a guess. A great loss.

But another prominent
photographer lent his talent.
Judith Thurmon writes that Cecil Beaton
took many of these photos of
gowns created by genius designer
Charles
James:

The Idea was "that any woman at
a difficult moment can imagine
herself a Duchess,"
although, at a difficult moment,
you could never have squeezed a
James gown into the stall of a
ladies' room.

The donor of this
ad said it came from the late
1940s and portrays the famous
model Suzi Parker. The donor cut
off the bottom part, which
contained the words "Modess . . .
. because." Note the selective
fuzzing of the image, sometimes
done by putting petroleum jelly on
the parts of the camera lens.

October 1948. This model
is perhaps Barbara Hutton.

March 1949

1950

1951

May 1952

1953

This does not
follow exactly the format of the
others, but it does have the because
in the same style. The text reads: